Question

A Famous Writer

In her speech to Harvard students in 2008， J.K.Rowling said， “…seven years after my graduation day， I had failed on an epic scale.”She went on to say that “by every usual standard， I was the biggest failure I knew.”

It might surprise some readers to know which period of her life J.K.Rowling was talking about here. She is talking about her life when she was writing the first novel of the Harry Potter books. The idea came to her during a train ride in 1990. In December that year， her mother died. The next few years were difficult for her. In 1993， her first but short marriage ended. She didn’t have much money and life was not easy. As she said in that same speech， “That period of my life was a dark one and I had no idea that there was going to be…a kind of fairytale resolution.”

As we all know now， the Harry Potter books went on to become extremely successful and also made her very rich. So where does think this success came from? She thinks it is a direct result of her early failures. As she went on to say， “Failure meant I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that really mattered to me… I was set free. ”

Her Harry Potter series was completed with its final book in 2007. The books have become a very successful film series and three years after the final book was published， a Harry Potter theme park opened in the United States. She has written other books related to the Harry Potter series and her first book for adults was published in 2012. She has also remarried and now has three children.

1.Did J.K.Rowling give a speech to Harvard students in 2008?

2.When did J.K.Rowling’s first but short marriage end?

3.Where did J.K.Rowling think her success came from?

4.How many children does J.K.Rowling have now?

5.Why is J.K.Rowling famous?

Answer 1